Connecting the spots

Notes on migration and environment from a geographical perspective

Kayly Ober

Kayly Ober is a research associate/PhD candidate at the University of Bonn, where she works for the TransRe Project. She has over five years of professional experience on issues relating to climate change, adaptation, migration, gender, and human security. She has previously worked at the World Bank, Overseas Development Institute, Woodrow Wilson Center, and World Resources Institute, among others. CONTACT kober@uni-bonn.de

On 14 July, 2015, Kiribati had one more reason for celebration aside from its 37th anniversary of independence. Frank Bainimarama, the Prime Minister of Fiji, told i-Kiribatis that Fiji would welcome them with open arms if climate change was to rob them of their land. This offer looks more than just empty rhetoric. In 2014, Kiribati President Anote Tong purchased 20 square kilometers on the island of Vanua Levu in Fiji. “We would hope not to put everyone on [this] one piece of land, but if it became absolutely necessary, yes, we could do it,” President Tong told the Associated Press last year.

These regional links, amongst Pacific Islands and OECD countries, look set to deepen and harden as climate change increasingly threatens traditional livelihoods in the Pacific. Indeed, The International Labour Organisation (ILO), UN Economic Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP), and UN Development Programme (UNDP) look to analyze the potential of migration as adaptation through a 3 year project on “Pacific Climate Change and Migration.” According to its website, the project covers 11 different Pacific countries and attempts to facilitate national actions in Kiribati, Tuvalu, and Nauru, in particular, through enhanced national capacity to effectively participate in regional, bilateral, and global schemes on labor migration. Sophia Kagan, technical officer for the ILO, argues that unemployment and limited opportunities in Kiribati and Tuvalu should lead to the creation of preferential quota schemes in Australia and New Zealand. Whether or not this regional model of labor migration proves fruitful in the face of climate change is yet to be seen.

However, they find that “the ECOWAS Protocol on Free Movement allows in principle all ECOWAS citizens the right of admission in member states but relies heavily on political cooperation and goodwill.” This isn’t surprising: regional cooperation is always easier said than done. This kind of outlet is also, perhaps, outside the remit of climate change solutions. Although migration is seen as a possible adaptation strategy pursuant to the Cancun Adaptation Framework, just how policies will be separate from current migration schemes not linked to climate change remains unclear. We may very well see just how far these types of policies will translate into action at COP21 in Paris.